| British Malignant Hyperthermia Association (BMHA) | |||||||||||||||||
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![]() The BMHA exists to help Registered Charity |
Welcome The susceptibility to malignant hyperthermia is inherited. It is often noted for the first time during a general anaesthetic, when the patient develops a high body temperature (hyperthermia), and muscle rigidity. Muscle tissue is rapidly destroyed by the hyper-rigidity and the break-down products damage the kidneys leading to renal failure. If you are visiting our website because you, or someone in your family, has recently been told they may be affected by Malignant Hyperthermia, we hope to be able to give you some information and support. Those of us who are involved with the BMHA have all been through the shock of being told we may be affected by MH. Some of us have lost relatives, though thankfully, this is very, very rare these days. We really do appreciate that people around you, relatives, friends and even members of the medical profession, may not know anything about it. And let us assure you that many people, who are susceptible to MH, have had operations and anaesthetics after the diagnosis. However, you must make an anaesthetist aware of the problem before you give your consent, and preferably before you go into hospital. Help starts hereWe suggest that you go to the ‘About MH’ and ‘Screening’ pages. These are quite long articles, which will take you some time to read and digest. They have been written by the doctors in the UK who are dealing with MH on a daily basis and who run the MH Investigation Unit, so you can be assured that the information is reliable. They are both downloadable too, so you can read them later at your leisure – just click on the link at the bottom of the appropriate pages.
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